Star Trek: Voyager - 042 - Protectors Read online

  “Cadet,” Chakotay greeted him warmly.

  “Captain,” Icheb replied. “This has been a most unusual experience.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I have attended several memorial services in my years on Earth, but none of them felt like this one.”

  “Were you personally acquainted with those whose services you attended?” Chakotay asked.

  “Yes.”

  “And did you know anyone among the fleet who was lost?”

  “No. That is what is odd about it,” Icheb added. “In the past I felt almost nothing, even at Admiral Janeway’s memorial. I remember being so cold, so confused. But standing here tonight, I was deeply moved.”

  Chakotay’s face clouded over. “Why do you think that was?”

  “Perhaps because of my connection to you and the rest of Voyager’s crew,” Icheb suggested. “I was saddened for all of you, all that you’ve lost. And I couldn’t help thinking about Q.”

  “You don’t have that same sense of belonging among your friends at the Academy?”

  Icheb shook his head. “It’s different. It’s all so competitive. You wish to trust, but it is hard to know where to place that trust. Here there is no question.”

  Chakotay swallowed hard. “I knew this wasn’t going to be easy, but now it’s even more difficult.”

  “To what are you referring, sir?”

  “I received word from the Academy this afternoon,” Chakotay replied. “They have denied your request to remain with the fleet. You will return to Earth tomorrow aboard the Galen.”

  Icheb’s cheeks burned and his eyes stung. “Did they say why?”

  Chakotay paused to consider his response. Finally he said, “When Voyager was too far from the Alpha Quadrant for you to go there and begin your work at the Academy, it made sense for you to do so here. But that is no longer the case. Because it is possible for you to return, they feel you must. Yes, things get interesting out here, and there is much you will learn when you are once again on a starship, but you have almost a full year left in your course requirements. And I think they want to make sure that you are being evaluated as objectively as possible.”

  “I studied at the Academy under both Commander Tuvok and Seven of Nine. I assure you that neither of them allowed our personal relationships to affect their evaluations of my performance,” Icheb insisted.

  “Knowing both of them, that’s not surprising.” Chakotay smiled. “But it’s more than that. Part of being at the Academy is living outside your comfort zone. They’re preparing you to function at your best in the most inhospitable of circumstances. Returning is the harder road, Icheb.”

  Icheb sighed, unable to contain his disappointment.

  “Should I request that they reconsider?”

  Chakotay shrugged. “I don’t think it would make any difference. But we’re scheduled to be out here another two and half years, and you can bet I’ll be requesting that you join us as soon as you graduate.”

  This lifted Icheb’s spirits a bit. “Thank you, Captain.”

  Chakotay placed an arm over Icheb’s shoulder. “Hard as it might be to imagine right now, Icheb, I’m certain there are lessons for you back there still to be learned. I wonder if you realize how much the connection you feel to this crew resulted from your own choices as much as ours. We accepted you with open arms, but you returned our affections. You earned our trust. Maybe it’s time to open yourself to the possibility that you could have friendships just as meaningful among your peers at the Academy.”

  Icheb nodded. “I will try, Captain.”

  “But we can’t do that!” Lieutenant Reginald Barclay insisted vehemently.

  His superior officer, the captain of the Galen, Commander Clarissa Glenn, seemed to take his outburst in stride. She was a lithe woman with delicate features and long reddish-blond hair that hung loosely tonight over her dress uniform. She was also as serene as any Starfleet officer Barclay had ever known.

  “We serve at their pleasure, Lieutenant,” she reminded him. “They can and will order us to go where they please.”

  Barclay tried to collect himself. “Have you read my latest reports, Commander? Our survey of the asteroid field surrounding New Talax is not yet complete, but I’m certain that with more time, or by adding Voyager’s astrometrics sensors to our work, we will find the asteroid where Meegan buried those other canisters.”

  Glenn placed a gentle hand on his arm. “I know how you feel about this. I know you feel guilty about Meegan’s fate, and that guilt has been driving you to work this problem to the exclusion of your other duties. For the last few months, that wasn’t a problem. And I will advise Captain Chakotay of your work and suggest strongly that he complete the survey before he departs on his next mission. But we are setting our course for the Alpha Quadrant in the morning, and you will be with us when we do.”

  “You don’t understand, Commander!”

  “Lieutenant,” Glenn said softly but forcefully.

  Knowing he had stepped right up to, if not over, the line, Barclay took a deep breath as he searched for another argument.

  “Meegan is incredibly dangerous. She is the most advanced hologram ever created, and she is under the control of an entity its own people condemned to permanent incarceration. It was trapped in a disembodied state for thousands of years. And now she’s out there, with seven more just like her. She must be found and stopped.”

  “I agree, but we aren’t the only people out here capable of doing that,” Glenn reminded him.

  “Then let me stay,” he pleaded. “You’re going straight home and will return shortly, I presume. What use am I to you on a quick run like that? Transfer me to Voyager in the interim.”

  Glenn’s eyes widened. “The Galen is a ship staffed almost entirely by holograms you helped create. You are my senior holographic specialist on board. You don’t think your presence is vital? What if something goes wrong on our ‘quick run’?”

  “It won’t,” Barclay hoped, but also knew when he was beat.

  As his shoulders fell, he caught sight of Admiral Janeway moving through the crowd, head bent low. Immediately, he moved to block her path.

  “Admiral Janeway,” he greeted her enthusiastically.

  She looked up and it was obvious even to Barclay that she was struggling. Her cheeks were ruddy and her eyes glistened.

  “Can it wait, Reg?” she asked.

  “I . . .” Barclay began, until her distress moved him beyond his own cares. “Of course, Admiral,” he replied and moved to allow her to pass.

  After a moment, Glenn said softly, “I may not know her as well as you do, but I don’t honestly think she would have countermanded my orders on this one. Galen is taking her home tomorrow.”

  This was almost as troubling to Barclay as his visceral need to find Meegan, but he sighed in acceptance.

  “Understood, Commander.”

  Chapter Three

  GALEN

  “You wished to see me, Doctor?” Seven asked as she entered the holographic doctor’s private office just off the main sickbay of the Galen.

  He looked up from the padd he was studying with his most gracious smile and replied, “I did. And thank you for obliging me at this early hour. We’re scheduled to depart shortly, but I have a request to make, which I hope you will consider.”

  “Of course,” Seven replied. Although there was nothing in his manner to suggest anything less than cordial camaraderie, she was a bit surprised to see it so flagrantly focused in her direction. Only a few days earlier, the Doctor had become aware that she had entered into an intimate relationship with Voyager’s counselor, Lieutenant Hugh Cambridge. She had already witnessed in the Doctor a certain amount of distress at this development and believed that the next time they had an opportunity to speak privately, the subject would take priority. She did not believe the Doctor was jealous of the counselor. They had enjoyed a purely platonic relationship for years now. His misgivings more likely arose from his gener
al dislike of Cambridge, and on that count, she could not necessarily fault him. Hugh could be maddening. It had taken her some time to warm to him and see past his carefully constructed, rather acerbic façade.

  She was both relieved and troubled as he moved past her into the main bay and gestured for her to stand beside him at a data console. His attention was clearly elsewhere. Seven chided herself for imaging that her private life should be a source of concern to the Doctor. He’d had several days now to process the development and obviously decided to offer her what support he could, if only by his silence.

  As she turned her attention to the data now displayed before her, Seven wished that she actually believed this assessment. Unfortunately, her years of proximity to the Doctor belied it.

  “I wasn’t sure until last night that what I am about to propose would even be possible,” he began. “I’ve spent the last several months studying the catoms the Caeliar left in you in place of your Borg implants, and as you know, that work has been largely hypothetical in nature. I understand what this programmable matter is and does, but it had been interwoven so seamlessly into your organic tissue that differentiation has been all but impossible.”

  “Are you saying you have isolated the catoms, Doctor?” Seven asked, surprised. She had come to believe that such a feat could take years.

  The Doctor smiled in feigned humility. “You doubted me, Seven?” he teased.

  “Of course not,” she replied quickly. “But even at their subatomic level, they mimic the organic tissue that surrounds them.”

  “They do,” the Doctor agreed, pointing to a display of two neural cells that seemed to be identical. “Here we have isolated two cells from the area of your brain that once housed your cortical node. It’s worth noting that my previous familiarity with your Borg implants was instrumental in this work. I may not have known what I was looking at, but at least I knew where to look.”

  “I see no obvious differences between these two cells, Doctor,” Seven said.

  “At this level of magnification, you wouldn’t. But let’s look closer, shall we?” he suggested. He then increased the display’s reference beyond the cellular level, to the molecular.

  Seven studied the display, but again, saw nothing to explain the Doctor’s enthusiasm. As the molecules in question seemed to float freely before her eyes, she searched the display hungrily for evidence of the Doctor’s breakthrough.

  “There,” he said, freezing the display and pointing to a particular structure.

  Seven looked, and for a brief moment wondered if the Doctor had brought her here as a pretense. Then, without his permission, she again increased the magnification, and her breath caught in her chest.

  “What is that?” she asked softly.

  “It is a synthetic marker, coded into the molecular structure of this catom that identifies it as unique to you and designates its current purpose,” the Doctor replied.

  Seven turned to the Doctor and smiled. “That’s amazing,” she said sincerely.

  He shrugged as if it were nothing.

  As Seven considered the possibilities this discovery now made real, she asked, “What is your next intended course of action?”

  “With your permission, I would like to extract a few of these molecules. I can now state to a certainty which ones are catomic in nature, and it is essential that I study them in their pure form.”

  Seven did not wish to dampen his enthusiasm, but something in her revolted at the thought. “Are you certain that’s wise?”

  “It’s the next logical step,” the Doctor argued.

  “Are you certain I can survive without them?” she clarified.

  The Doctor appeared stricken. “I wouldn’t suggest it otherwise,” he insisted. “I actually believe now that your catoms are self-replicating.”

  This was news to Seven and left her thunderstruck. “Upon what do you base that hypothesis?”

  “When you were contacted by Doctor Frazier, you experienced a blackout, did you not?”

  “I did.”

  “Your scans following that incident, like those I took after your lengthy telepathic conversations with the Indign, indicated slight damage to the areas of your brain surrounding your catoms. But now that I know what I’m looking at, I can also confirm that the damage done was repaired by an infusion of more catoms. You should study the data yourself if you don’t believe me,” the Doctor suggested.

  “You’re saying my damaged neural tissue was replaced by new catoms?” Seven asked.

  “Yes.” He nodded. “You have only to compare your initial scans from when you arrived on Voyager to your most recent ones.”

  “Does that suggest that my catoms will continue to replicate indefinitely should I experience a more serious neural injury?” Seven asked.

  “I don’t think so,” the Doctor replied. “We’ve already established that these catoms are ‘powered,’ so to speak, by your body’s internal system. I don’t know if they could keep you alive or continue to regenerate in the presence of massive trauma. But they are hearty little fellows, nonetheless. And who knows? What I can isolate and study, I might at some point be able to replicate.”

  The thought was intriguing, and if the Doctor was right, the risks of removal of a tiny population of catoms did not seem to outweigh the potential of one day perhaps duplicating this technology—for Seven, and others. It would, by any estimation, be a great leap forward for medical science.

  “Very well.” Seven nodded. “How do you wish to proceed?”

  The Doctor smiled again, clearly reassured by her confidence in him. “If you’ll lie down here, I’ll begin the extraction,” he said, gesturing to the nearest biobed. “It shouldn’t take long.”

  Seven did as she was bidden, and the Doctor set to work double-checking his instruments and displays. As she tried to relax, a question formed in her mind.

  “You said you made this breakthrough last night?” she asked.

  “I did,” he replied.

  “Didn’t you attend the memorial?”

  “I did,” he said. “I left a little early.”

  “How early?” she asked.

  At this, the Doctor turned on her, clearly vexed. “Just after Admiral Janeway began the recitation of names, if you must know.”

  Seven rose up on her elbows. “I am not criticizing you, Doctor. I am merely surprised.”

  “As soon as the final complement of the fleet was established, complete medical records of every officer and crewman present were added to my memory buffers. I received the casualty list several days ago and have already marked those files as deceased. You’ll forgive me if my zeal to continue working on a project that might ultimately result in saving lives, including your own, overcame my desire to waste time listening to data that has already been integrated into my stored memory files.”

  Taken aback, Seven resumed her supine position. But her mind whirred as she considered this revelation, as well as the heat with which it had been delivered.

  She could not remember the Doctor speaking so callously of himself in a long time. Yes, he was a complicated holographic program, but he also was sentient and usually took great care to think of himself as much more than a collection of matrices, processors, and files. He tended to dismiss others who thought of him only as a creation or a tool. The Doctor had, long ago, surpassed his programming, and to Seven, this felt like a regression. She was certain that had anyone else described him this way, the Doctor would have been highly insulted.

  “I apologize,” she began.

  “There is no need,” he said, returning to a more casual tone. “Shall we begin?”

  Seven paused but decided she did not care to risk upsetting him further.

  “Of course.”

  “And if you don’t mind, I need to concentrate. I’ll let you know as soon as I’m finished.”

  Seven nodded, though she was stung by his clinical manner. He had been trying to help her, and she had offended him. It wasn’t the first
time, but she had thought herself long past such lapses, particularly where one so dear to her was concerned.

  She did not expect to feel anything as the procedure began, and she didn’t. She was conscious, however, of a slight increase in her respiration as well as an uncomfortable twinge in her stomach as the Doctor began to hum absentmindedly and so slightly off-key that only her enhanced auditory senses would have registered it.

  Soon enough, he was finished, and Seven had never been so grateful to reach the end of a procedure. She moved to sit up the moment he indicated she was free to do so.

  “How do you feel, Seven?” he inquired.

  “Fine,” Seven assured him. “Is that all?”

  “For the time being,” he replied. “I suspect we’ll be rejoining the fleet soon, and if possible, I will keep you apprised of any new developments in the interim.”

  “Thank you, Doctor,” she said. “Safe travels.”

  “And to you.” He smiled.

  She spent the few moments it took for her to walk from sickbay to the transporter room trying to dispel the anxiety that had welled up within her. As she stepped onto the platform, it occurred to her that unless she could pinpoint its source, it would be difficult to quell.

  Then, it hit her, as she felt the transport beam begin to take hold. The tune the Doctor had hummed during the procedure had taken her back to a time when he had been forced to try and extract information from her mind without the benefit of his ethical subroutines. It had been years earlier, when Voyager had encountered the Equinox, another Starfleet vessel lost in the Delta Quadrant, and the Doctor’s program had been intentionally sabotaged.

  They had actually sung the song together in perfect harmony after those troubling events. It had been part of the healing process for both. Seven could not recall the Doctor humming or singing “My Darling Clementine,” slightly off-key in her presence since then.

  “What do you think?” Kathryn asked as Chakotay stepped into the quarters that would serve as her home for the next few days.